“All right,” said La Liebre. “She can give him her last blessing, but then no more! He hangs, and that’s final!”
Seeing her mother, Lupe got down on all fours to crawl under the soldiers’ legs who were holding her and her sisters back with the crowd. But one of the soldiers saw her and grabbed her by her hair, jerking her back so viciously that Lupe felt the skin pull away from her eyes.
“Don’t you do that again!” said Sophia, grabbing Lupe in her arms. “All we can do now is pray for a miracle, mi hijita.”
“Mama will save him!” screamed Carlota. “I know she will!”
María was holding Carlota in her arms. Esabel was standing behind María, giving her comfort.
Don Manuel was still arguing, trying to prove to the people that he was a just man and that he wasn’t a pawn of the American company.
And all this time, Señor Jones stood over to the side, joined by a couple of his young engineers. One was eagerly setting up his camera to take pictures.
And then out came El Borracho, getting up from behind the huge tree in which they were going to hang Victoriano. He’d been asleep in a drunken stupor the whole time. Glancing about, he couldn’t figure out what was going on.
Doña Guadalupe rushed forward. She was just about to hug her son when the man called The Jack Rabbit stepped in front of her. “Wait!” he said. “What do you got there with that Bible?”
“My rosary,” she said.
“Let me see,” he said.
“No, let her be!” yelled Don Manuel. “Haven’t you done enough?”
“You better shut up, old man,” said La Liebre, turning on the mayor. “We caught him with the gold!”
As they spoke, Doña Guadalupe rushed to her son and hugged him, covering him with her shawl and whispering in his ear. But Victoriano was so far gone that he didn’t recognize her, much less understand what she was saying.
Doña Guadalupe cried out in grief, pretending to lose control.
La Liebre could see that the crowd was getting louder and his men were having a hard time holding them back. People were coming out from everywhere—from rooftops, from over walls—and they outnumbered his men sixty to one.
“All right,” said La Liebre, “to show I’m a fair man, she can give her son her blessing, but then no more!” He drew his revolver. “The law must be respected! He’s a thief and he must hang!”
Hearing this, El Borracho laughed and turned his ass toward the many-scarred leader, lifted his right leg and let out a tremendous fart.
“This is what I think of you and your law!” said El Borracho, cranking his ass around and around, farting all the while. “You don’t do shit unless Señor Jones pulls your rope. You ugly abortion of the devil!”
Everyone in the plaza heard his words, and they were just going to laugh when La Liebre brought up his pistol, firing once, twice, three times, sending El Borracho’s body jerking forward with each shot.
Blood and foam boiled out of El Borracho’s mouth as he came to rest in a sitting position, eyes still staring in shock.
Silence fell over the plaza. No one so much as breathed. But then people started screaming, bellowing, raising their fists in anger. El Borracho was one of their most beloved people. He and his wife had brought their children into the world and sang and danced at their weddings.
And at this moment, Doña Guadalupe took her knife from under her shawl and tried to cut the rope between her son’s two fists. But Victoriano’s hands were tied so close together that she couldn’t get the blade between them.
“Turn your wrist,” she said, “quick, we don’t have much time!”
But Victoriano didn’t move his wrists and so, out of desperation, Doña Guadalupe took his ear between her teeth, biting and twisting it with all her might. He opened his eyes wide with pain. Suddenly, he saw his mother and realized what was going on. His mother told him what to do again, and this time, Victoriano understood her words and his mind came reeling to the present. He turned his wrists. He could feel her cutting. But they’d tied him up with a twisted rawhide rope and it was tough to cut.
Then Victoriano saw La Liebre coming toward them, reloading his pistol.
“All right,” said La Liebre, grabbing Doña Guadalupe by the shoulder. “That’s enough! Get away from there!”
The people screamed, yelling for La Liebre to let her finish her blessing. Their roar was so great that the many-scarred man lifted his arms, gesturing that it was all right.
“Mi hijito,” Doña Guadalupe whispered, “I have a gun under my shawl. And as soon as you’re free, I’ll give it to you, then I’ll leap back, screaming. And you run to the creek.” She was cutting the final strand. “Understand, mi hijito, I’m not cutting you free so you can be brave and get killed. I want you running so you can live. You run, you hear me? You run for the creek when I jump back.”
His hands were suddenly free.
“Don’t move yet,” she said. “Work your hands. Get circulation into them. Do it now!”
He did as told. And she could see that his eyes looked alert now. She felt he was ready. “Here’s the gun, take it. I love you, mi hijito. I love you with all my heart. Run! When I leap back!”
And she leapt back with her arms stretched up toward the sky, giving him cover as she screamed to the heavens, “God be with you, my son!”
But it was all for no good. The man called The Jack Rabbit had been through many battles. So, when he saw the old woman leap back with arms stretched up toward the heavens, he drew his gun, knowing it was an escape, and rushed in, knocking her out of the way.
In that split moment, just as he was turning to run, Victoriano saw the man of lightning reflexes come racing behind his mother. He stopped. He crouched, spinning about, fully realizing that he could never get away from this man who was so fast. He fired over his mother’s shoulder just as La Liebre’s ugly face suddenly appeared before him.
The man’s face exploded with red blood and pieces of white bone, and then Victoriano was running, shooting into the air as he ran, drawing the soldiers away from his beloved mother.
People scattered—soldiers and villagers alike. Lupe and her sisters broke from the crowd and rushed to their mother as half of the armed men chased after their brother.
But Victoriano was gone, racing through the thick foliage below the plaza, jumping over the rocks that he’d known all his life. Then he leapt into the water, going over the series of short waterfalls where the roaring white waters went down to a steady, blue flow.
The soldiers fired a few quick shots at his turning, twisting, swimming body, but then quit the chase and went back to the plaza.
When they got back, they found the courtyard full of people. The chubby redheaded man was in charge now that La Liebre was dead. He’d arrested the old woman and the mayor.
“But I didn’t know she had a gun!” shouted Don Manuel, as they dragged him and Doña Guadalupe across the cobblestones.
Under the big tree, the soldiers put a rope around the necks of the mayor and Doña Guadalupe. But the people had had enough. They were willing to die so they could live. They came pouring through the armed men like rain through an open hand, mobbing the walkways, climbing over rooftops and stone fences by the hundreds.
Señora Muñoz brought all her children under the tree where they were preparing to hang Doña Guadalupe and Don Manuel. She sat down with them on the cobblestones and they began to sing. Lupe and her family joined them and so did Doña Manza’s family. The rest of the people understood what was happening, and Lupe and her sisters watched them carpet the plaza with their bodies packed so tightly together that the soldiers couldn’t move, much less throw the rope up into the branches to do the hanging.
The singing filled the canyon, traveling up to the mighty cathedral rocks and coming back down in an echoing symphony of sound.
Lupe gripped her mother’s hand with her right hand and Manuelita’s with her left. The singing continued and grew in strength until it wa
s of such naked, raw magnitude that Lupe just knew to the marrow of her bones that they were united with God. They were with God Almighty and He was giving them His power.
Señor Jones was the first one to realize what was happening, and he threw his cigar down and left quickly.
The red-headed leader glanced about, trying to figure out how he could get out of the plaza before they ripped his weapons away from him and beat him to death. He took the rope off of Doña Guadalupe’s neck and fled. The other soldiers followed him.
People saw the fear in the soldier’s eyes as they fled, fear that they’d been feeling themselves all their lives. It gave them heart; they raised their voices all the more. Tears came to Lupe’s eyes. They’d done it, they really had. And she continued to sing.
Well over five hundred men, women and children were singing. Their united voices drowned out even the great thundering noises of the American gold mine company. The miners quit their labor and stood up to listen. Then they dropped their tools to go see what was going on with their families down in the town.
Lupe and her sisters hugged their mother, weeping with joy. A great flock of parrots came sweeping down from the towering cliffs, squawking loudly.
“Angels,” said Lupe, and everyone turned and saw that it was true. The parrots were, indeed, angels.
All that night, the Americans slept with guns at their sides for the first time since the Revolution had begun. Soldiers, they’d always been able to handle in one way or another, but this was something entirely different.
The moon came out and the coyotes howled, and the people of the canyon remained united in God’s wondrous spirit far into the night.
BOOK TWO
The Hand of God
The year was 1869 and his name was Don Pío Castro. He was short, dark, strong, heavy-bearded, and he was riding north from Mexico City along with his two older brothers, Cristóbal and Agustín, looking for raw, unused land.
Don Pío was one of the greatest horsemen in all the republic, and he’d fought alongside the great Don Benito Juárez against the French. He’d risen to the rank of Colonel and, after they’d defeated the French, he’d laid down his arms, leaving the army of his own free will, thinking that it was now time to put together the nation that had been torn apart by war.
Riding north from Mexico City on fine horses and leading two good mules, Don Pío and his two older brothers passed through the pastoral valley of Guanajuato and saw the rich haciendas and the well-watered fields and the well-fed livestock. But they found nothing they could use. All the good lands had long ago been taken by the Church or the rich and powerful.
On the twenty-first day of their journey north, Don Pío and his brothers came to the mountains on the west side of the Guanajuato Valley and they climbed up into the high country called Los Altos de Jalisco.
That night Don Pío and his brothers camped on a knoll high above the valley floor and they looked down into the rich valley controlled by the rich hacendados.
Don Pío’s heart grew heavy.
He was married, he had three daughters, and he’d been fighting for the welfare of his beloved country for well over twenty years. First, he’d fought as a boy down in the lower part of the boot of Mexico against the hacendados, who’d kept him and his parents in servitude for generations.
Then, he’d taken up arms along with Benito Juárez and Porfirio Díaz. They’d fought the well-armed, well-trained French soldiers with nothing but their bare hands and the hope to see a better day for their children. The people died by the thousands. Don Pío alone lost six brothers, five sisters, both of his parents and all of his uncles and cousins. But for what? Even after they had won, the rich still controlled the good lands like the valley before him.
Don Pío sat there, looking down into the darkness, feeling perplexed and tired. But he couldn’t sleep. It seemed to him that maybe it was never going to change. He’d seen good men from humble origins get a little power and change overnight into ruthless monsters against the poor.
Cristóbal and Agustín said good night to Don Pío and went to sleep rolled up in their blankets. Don Pío put some more wood on the fire and stayed up, looking at the stars and heavens. He and his brothers had been looking for undeveloped land for over a year and they didn’t have much time. Of the thousand who’d followed Don Pío out of the army, he only had about a hundred good men left. The others had lost faith in him and had gone back to work under the same yoke of the hacendados—whom they had fought so hard to escape—or they’d turned into bandits.
Don Pío sat there on the grassy knoll, small and wiry. He looked more Spanish-Moor than full-blooded Indian. He stared down into the darkness. He knew he couldn’t afford to fail his few remaining men, and he knew he couldn’t afford to pass up the offer that he’d recently received from a rich man named La Farga. La Farga had offered to back Don Pío and his men with enough money so they could build up a ranch and they could all make a good profit.
He sat there, thinking, figuring, looking up at the stars and heavens and then down into the darkness of the valley.
A coyote called in the distance and the moon went behind some clouds. Don Pío brought out his rosary and began to finger the crude, round beads made of stone, rolling them between his thumb and index finger as he asked God for guidance.
He sat there on the knoll, listening to their horses and mules grazing alongside him in the quiet of the night and he prayed long and hard, truly needing God’s help as he’d never needed it before.
Suddenly, across the valley, he saw a small pale light and he knew it was God coming to speak to him. He could feel it in his heart. The coyote called again. Don Pío sat on the knoll, looking at the small, pale light across the valley of darkness and he felt no fear. God was with him. God, the Creator of all things, was here with him. Don Pío gave himself over to God, without question, and a great peace came over him.
The light exploded, bursting through the rosy-white clouds in beautiful colors of yellow and pink. Don Pío sat up, captivated by the magic of it all. Then he realized that this was, indeed, the miracle of a whole new day.
His eyes filled with tears and he sat there in rapture, giving witness to the new day that Almighty God was giving him and he suddenly realized what a new day really was; it was a fresh start in la vida for mankind. Each morning was a whole new beginning.
He smiled, tears of joy coming to his eyes, and he watched the light of the new day come across the darkness of the valley, reaching out to him on God’s rosy-light fingers over the distant mountains, across the valley of Guanajuato some two hundred miles away. He fingered the stone rosary in his dark, small, well-made, callous-hard hands, and instantly, in one bursting, flashing moment, he knew everything.
“Wake up!” he yelled, leaping to his feet and shouting to his brothers. “We’ve found it! This is the place!”
His two brothers awoke. Cristóbal, big and strong, growled like a bear for having been awakened. But Agustín, of medium height and build, simply sat up, rubbing his eyes.
“This is the place we’ve been searching for!” repeated Don Pío excitedly.
Looking around, his two brothers scrutinized the knoll on which they’d camped and they saw nothing but dark rocks and cliffs, groves of wild oaks and steep gullies.
“Don Pío,” said Cristóbal, “you’ve lost your mind, go back to sleep. Nothing will grow here!”
But Don Pío refused to be silenced, standing up tall and proud, all five foot, two inches of him. “That’s it exactly! It will be hard to get anything to grow here! That’s why nobody wants this land! The only thing it’s fit for is goats and snakes! That’s why we can build our homes here and raise our children in peace for generations to come!”
“And they’ll be strong, hard-working children because every man will have to do his own labor! And at no time will our children or our children’s children get so rich that they’ll be able to enslave their neighbor!”
“You’re damned right, they wo
n’t,” bellowed Cristóbal, tossing his blanket to the side and leaping to his feet in raging anger. “Because they’ll starve!”
“No, not starve,” said Don Pío, “but stay strong! And they will be able to live in peace for generations because the rich and powerful won’t ever want these lands! Believe me, dear brother, this is the place we’ve been searching for all of our lives!”
Towering over Don Pío, Cristóbal glanced around at the cliffs and rocks and trees and he spat on the ground. “If you choose this place,” he said, “then I’m out, Don Pío! I fought too long and too hard to end up in these God-forsaken mountains like un indio sin razón!”
But Don Pío wasn’t about to lose his oldest brother; he was the most loyal and greatest of all fighters. “Please,” he said, “calm down, hermanito. This morning I had a vision. God spoke to me, and showed me that each new day is a miracle. Each new day is a whole new beginning. That’s why I see everything so clearly right now and I can say to you, without a shadow of a doubt, that this, my dear brothers, is the place that we’ve been looking for. Not that rich valley down below where powerful men can enslave the poor, no matter how many battles we fight and win. This is the place where we can reach up to the heavens every morning of our lives and touch the hand of God with an honest heart!”
Don Pío reached up to the heavens with both hands, arms rippling with muscle. Cristóbal saw his brother’s large, dark eyes, and he knew that he was insane with joy.
Screaming with rage, Cristóbal continued to argue. But Agustín, the middle brother, the calmer brother who was married and had six sons and five daughters, simply rolled out of his blanket and put some wood on the fire, heated a bunch of tortillas, cut some hard, cured cheese, and handed each brother a burrito.
Cristóbal ate and shouted at Don Pío until the food hit his stomach. Then he quit. They saddled up their horses, rode over the top of the knoll, through the oak forest and to the high lakes covered with wild lilies.
Their horses and mules drank and they rode down into the deep canyons where the wild orchids grew. They saw deer and quail, forest and grassland, cliffs of rock and flat-topped mesas. They shot a fat deer and ate to their fill. They grazed their horses and two mules, then returned to Mexico City.
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